The Watch Snob Breaks Down Rolex's Strange New Air King

Bremont Watches

Dear Watch Snob®,

What's your current thinking on Bremont?

Best,
A laconic but devoted reader

My current thinking on Bremont is that, like so many watch brands, they seem to find the temptation to be their own worst enemy irresistible. The most significant damage that they have done to their own credibility, of course, is the nasty business with what they called an in-house movement in a limited edition watch back in 2014, which of course was anything but an in-house movement. But the problem is larger than that. When the company first got started, they managed to establish a good deal of trust with consumers fairly quickly, with an interesting brand story and well-priced, well-made wristwatches that offered a combination of features not easily found among their competitors.

The watches are still good, but one gets the impression that Nick and Giles are somewhat out of ideas and are devoting more energy to expensive, difficult-to-manage marketing partnerships than to watchmaking. To a certain extent, this is to be expected, but between the business with the alleged in-house movement, and the growth of the brand to the point where it is doing things like the America’s Cup, they are beginning to take on a bit of a me-too feel while still suffering from the damage done to their credibility.

I do hope that they will, as they grow, not do themselves such avoidable injuries again and I also hope they don’t forget that they are, in the eyes of those of us who wish them well, a watch company and not a marketing company.

Rolex Air King

Snob,

Could you please weigh in on Rolex's most recent rendition of the Air King? The inner works seem to be remarkable for its segment, but the design makes for quite a polarising piece: some love it and find a revelation in it, some hate it with a vengeance...

I think the Snob's words are a true north in this case.

The new Air King is a watch I struggle to make sense of in the larger context of Rolex’s history, and which I struggle to understand as a design. Traditionally, the Air King was a small, affordable watch with no complications (except, of course, for a center seconds) and it had a certain underdog charm, as well as often being, as the cheapest Rolex, a ubiquitous awards watch (the Domino’s Pizza dial is probably the best known of these).

The new Air King is a collision of frankly odd style choices with, apparently, a desire on the part of Rolex to make it seem like a “real” pilot’s watch, whatever that means. The five minute markers, as well as the use of yellow and green for the crown, logo, and seconds hand, struck many as bizarre. I don’t know whether it is a sign of impending senility, but I have to confess that in some odd way, the longer I look at it, the longer it seems to work. I yield to no one in my willingness to find a watch design patently absurd but there is, to my jaundiced eyes, something weirdly appealing about the Air King.